


Trouble

by Detownley



Category: Far Cry 5
Genre: Punishment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-06-20 19:27:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15541341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Detownley/pseuds/Detownley
Summary: Reader joined the cult for the chance at a good life, but now they're coming to realise that that's not what this cult is offering them. After an altercation with a fellow cultist, Reader ends up in trouble. Now they have to face John Seed.





	Trouble

"Oh, god." You think, placing the bloodied knife onto your dresser. "I’m in big trouble, now."  
Plainly put; you’d just slashed a man’s face open, although in your defence, you’d thought he’d deserved it at the time. You’d been a member of Eden’s Gate for over a year, now, but you’d recently grown more and more uncomfortable with the church’s practices.   
The man in question had cornered you in your living quarters in John Seeds bunker. The Reaping had begun a few days ago - some Deputy had been stirring things up, apparently - and you’d voiced your concerns to the man regarding the stealing of peoples’ food and the killing of the people themselves.  
“It’s best to just stay out of it,” he had said, but that wasn’t good enough for you. You wanted out of the church and everything they were doing. As you had tried to leave, he had stepped in front of the door and grabbed you by the shoulders. Fearing what may happen, you took your hunting knife from its sheath and swung it up, slicing his cheek wide open. The man staggered back with one hand holding the wound shut, before running off to tell someone about the certified crazy person that was living among their ranks, and that had just brutally attacked him.  
You sigh, taking a seat on the bed and observing the trail of blood on the floor in front of you. After a few minutes, a woman appears in the doorway, holding a rifle. She steps into the room and hauls you up by the arm before shoving you out into the corridor.  
“I guess you’re taking me out back, right? The only thing to do with a rabid dog is to put it down.”  
“John wants to see ya,” she says, sternly, directing you down the hallways.  
You’d only met John Seed three times before, and he’d only spoken to you twice, directly. He seemed nice enough, with pretty, blue eyes and a softness in his voice that could be soothing if he wanted to appear that way. But his presence was often quite intimidating and something about him sent a shiver up your spine. The man was just off, and you still couldn’t shake the thought that this “project” wasn’t what you’d thought it was, and that it was hiding something much darker in the depths below the wholesome façade.   
You reach Johns office. Two heavily armoured men stand on either side of a reinforced door, both armed with rifles similar to the one that the woman holds against your back.   
“This one’s got an appointment with the boss,” the woman says, shoving you forwards.  
“Oh yeah? What did she do?” One of the men asks, looking you up and down through his visor.  
“How the fuck should I know? Just open the damn door, Abe; I got better shit I could be doin’.”  
The man steps forward and turns the wheel on the door before pulling it open with some difficulty. The woman pushes you forwards once more.  
You stumble into the room, almost losing your footing completely. John sits at a desk, surrounded by papers, although the room isn’t messy. You can tell he takes pride in his belongings being neatly ordered; even the papers that he works on are stacked tidily. John doesn’t seem to notice that you’ve entered the room until you clear your throat. He looks up from his work and puts his pen down.   
“Ah,” he says with a disapproving look on his face. You look around for the woman, not wanting to be left alone with him, but the woman has vanished, and you catch sight of the door just as it closes behind you.  
“I remember you. Y/N, yes?” John asks, beckoning you closer to the desk.  
You walk forward and nod, timidly. “Y-yes.”  
“Yes. I remember baptising you myself; quite recently, too.” John gets up from his seat and moves around the desk before leaning against the front of it with his arms folded across his chest and his legs crossed at the ankles. “A little birdy has told me something quite unsettling about you, Y/N.” he says.  
“I-“  
John holds his hand out, signalling for you to let him finish.  
“Now, I’m a firm believer in second chances – after all, none of us would be here if we hadn’t been given one - so I’m going to give you the opportunity to explain to me exactly why you would feel compelled to harm one of your brothers or sisters in the way that you did this afternoon.”  
You look down at your hands, twisting the signet ring on your finger. “I- I have concerns about the things the church is doing.” You confess. “I felt like I needed to express those concerns to someone, so I confided in Mr. Clarke – uh, Luke – and it kinda backfired.” You look back up at John and he nods, encouraging you to elaborate. “I told him that I didn’t think I could be a part of this anymore, and things got a little heated. He blocked me in and lay hands on me. I- I was scared, so I just grabbed the knife and… Is he okay?”  
John nods and you breathe a sigh of relief.  
“Okay,” John says, rubbing his beard between his finger and thumb and thinking the situation over. “Do you still have these… doubts?” He asks, picking a switchblade out of a pencil holder.   
You swallow. The switchblade doesn’t instil much confidence and you have an immense urge to lie; to tell him that you completely agree with all that the church does, and that you’ll happily return to your living quarters and live out the rest of your days in the bunker without further incident. But you’d heard whispers about John. People saying that it’s as if he can read peoples’ minds – that he knows exactly what you’re thinking at all times and thus no one could ever successfully lie to him. So you decide not to make things worse for yourself, and to tell the truth instead. “Yes,” you nod. “I think I do.”  
John suddenly steps forward with the switchblade still in hand, grabbing you at the tops of your arms and causing you to stumble. You gasp and grip onto his shirt, grabbing fistfuls of fabric to stop yourself from falling backwards.  
“Honesty. That’s good; that’s the first step,” John says, holding you close to him. “And I think we both know what the next step is.” He adds, flicking the switchblade open.  
You know exactly what the next step is. You place a hand to your chest, feeling over the scar left in the place where your first sin had been torn from you.  
“I don’t- I don’t want to,” you mumble, a sense of dread whirling in your stomach.  
“Nobody wants to,” John smiles. “But we have to. We have to let our sin bubble to the surface and be severed from us so that we may live in purity.” He says the words with such a calming voice and with such conviction, that you believe it almost as much as he does.  
“I-“   
Before you can say what you wanted to say, John has spun the two of you around and slammed you into the desk, bending you over it. He presses himself against you from behind, holding your head down against the desk with one hand, and using the other to lift up your shirt, exposing your back. He softly traces his hand across the area of skin where he wants the new sin to go and begins carving.  
The searing pain shoots down your spine and across your shoulder blades. You’d forgotten just how painful this process was, and now you’re remembering the months of recovery and the infection that you’d suffered last time. You feel around the desk, trying to find something to hold onto, but all you can find are papers and office supplies. You cry out, tears rolling down your cheeks and pooling on the surface of the desk.  
“Shh, shh,” John hushes you, using the hand that holds your head own to comb through your hair in a comforting gesture. “It’ll be over in the blink of an eye. You’re doing so well.”  
With a few more cuts, the word is complete. You can feel the blood trickling down your waist and you fear what John will do when he notices that there’s blood on his paperwork.  
“Sloth,” he says, wiping the area with his hand. “A terrible sin to be afflicted with.” He traces his fingertips over the scar on his chest as he gazes down at your new sin. He pulls you up by the scruff of your neck and pulls your shirt down for you. “If you ever have more doubts about what we do here, I want you to come straight to me,” he murmurs in your ear. “Understood?”  
You nod, wincing at the pain as he presses his body against your back, causing your shirt to get stuck to the fresh wound.   
“Good.” He steps back. “Go to the infirmary and have someone clean it up,” he says, wiping the switchblade on his jeans and tossing it back into the pencil holder.   
You wipe the tears and sweat from your face and compose yourself as John returns to his chair, tucking himself underneath the desk.  
“Oh, and if you ever harm a member of this project again,” he says, shuffling some papers and picking up his pen again. “I’ll string you up in the cafeteria as an example to everyone.”  
You turn to leave, walking unsteadily on legs that feel like jelly. You knock on the door and it slowly creeps open, revealing the woman waiting in the corridor. You take one last look back at John, who has returned to his work as if you’d never been in the room in the first place.  
“Holy hell. He really did a number on you, huh?” The woman chuckles as you step out of the office. “C’mon, let’s get your ass to the infirmary before you pass out,” she says, putting a hand on your shoulder and guiding your back down the corridor that you came from.


End file.
